


if time can be relative why can't death?

by alcego (orphan_account)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lotor is Very Patient, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Slice of Life, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-01
Updated: 2018-04-01
Packaged: 2019-04-16 17:42:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14170155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/alcego
Summary: Leaning forward, Lotor held Keith’s face in his long, elegant hands, claws sheathed for the moment.  His yellow eyes flitted over Keith’s face — and Keith flinched. He tried not to think of his appearance when he could avoid it (had never been the type to be concerned with his appearance anyway) but having someone — havingLotorlook at him like this… it was almost more than he could take. Especially when Lotor was so beautiful — flawless, sharp,handsome— that Keith could never hope to compare.Then Lotor smiled his sharp, cutting smile. Except it was softened, somehow, by the words he spoke: “You’re perfect, Keith.”And there was nothing to say to a thing like that, not when it had caught him off guard, but Keith couldn’t just leave it hanging on the wind. Compliments and congratulations left unacknowledged would haunt him for centuries. So Keith, breathless, stunned, amazed, said: “Thanks.”———A fic forMin.





	if time can be relative why can't death?

There were a few benefits to being dead.

For one thing, Keith didn’t have to deal with people anymore. No more awkward, stilted conversations about how his day was going and did he have any plans for the future? Being dead meant Keith didn’t need to worry about trying to befriend a classmate only to realize how horribly out of touch he was with other people.

Being dead meant he didn’t need to float through the days, going through the motions of being alive while wondering what the future had in store for him if it wasn’t following Shiro into the stars.

So yeah. Being dead wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Really, Keith should have expected death to be on a scale of relativity; all his life, Keith had thought death would be the conclusion of a life full of dead ends, but the universe had never given him anything without making him fight for it. Apparently, that went double for the sweet release of death.

Medically speaking, of course, Keith was inarguably dead: he had no pulse, no blood in his veins, and no need to breathe. Mentally, however, Keith was very much alive — or alive as one could be, anyway, after undergoing the Change. It wasn’t every day you woke up dead, after all.

Well, it hadn’t been, once upon a time.

———

Keith awoke to paper rustling as pages turned and the flickering light of his aging lamp. Blinking, he rubbed his eyes and tossed back the thin, ratty blanket he had fallen asleep with. Beneath him, the bed creaked, and Keith winced despite himself. Sounds were all so much _more_ in the mornings.

“You’re up early,” Lotor said from the other room.

Tottering through his door and into the living room, Keith yawned. “’M always up early,” he mumbled, words awkward as his mind woke up.

Lotor smiled and glanced at the growing sunlight. “Waking up would be easier if you slept through the day.”

“Sleepin’ at night is stupid,” Keith replied astutely, stopping in the middle of the living room and frowning at a greasy box sitting on the coffee table and the neatly folded blankets directly opposite of it. Lotor watched him from the couch, finger marking his place in the book.

Keith froze. There was a _longing_ in that look, one that Keith knew too well. He’d seen it every time his father handled the knife Keith’s mother had left behind. So why was Lotor watching him with that same expression?

Remembering the day Lotor had appeared at his door, casting apprehensive glances at the rising sun, Keith shoved the thought away. He had finally gotten used to living alone in the middle of the desert, only to be joined by a man as purple as Keith claiming to be a vampire.

Keith had objected to the term for obvious reasons. There was no way he’d allow himself to be called something like _that_ without first searching for an alternative. Though bemused by Keith’s request, Lotor had settled on _changeling,_ which suited Keith just fine. Now that they were growing used to each other, the universe had decided to change the rules. Typical.

“Of course, sleeping at night would be quite stupid,” Lotor said disagreeably. “For a human.”

From day one, Lotor would offer advice on all manner of things, “vampirism” not the least of them, but Keith wasn’t so down in the dumps that he was going to take advice from some exiled princeling sleeping on his couch. Clearly, the week they’d spent in each other’s company had changed very little.

Shrugging off Lotor’s critique, Keith slid the greasy cardboard box from the table and onto the floor. “Dunno if you remember, but I was human until a few months ago.”

Lotor hummed. “Yes. I suppose you were. Although that doesn’t explain why your sleep schedule is still off balance…”

Keith sat roughly on the floor and pulled open the box’s flaps. Inside lay a rusty motor, and he smiled at the sight of it. It was an old thing, useless for most hover-cycles, but it was perfect for Keith’s old racing model. With a few tweaks and several hour's worth cleaning it would get his cycle off the ground no problem.

Eyeing a loose bolt, Keith held out his hand. “Hand me the wrench on the side table, would you?” In one smooth motion, Lotor handed him the wrench and re-opened his book.

“The Change,” Lotor said mindlessly, “affects us all in similar and different ways. Some manifest more… primal behaviors and revert to their base selves, while others retain the integrity of their human minds.”

Focusing on the loose bolt, Keith snorted. “' _Integrity of the human mind?'_ ”

“A conscious morality,” Lotor explained. “They maintain the ability to choose. That is, of course, putting it simply. Young changelings are often overcome by their increased ability to access previously inactive sections of their minds. Sensations such as taste and smell become more reactive than before. As you’ve clearly learned,” Lotor gestured to the speckled burns beneath Keith’s right eye, “that goes doubly for our bodily responses to even trace amounts of corrosive elements.”

Frowning Keith rubbed his cheek against his shoulder. “That… makes sense, I guess.” Going forward, he’d need to be more careful while working on his cycle.

“Mm,” Lotor agreed, turning a page. “Our metabolic and physical changes, however, are far less sensible.”

“If you go on another rant about the scientific bullshit surrounding our need to drink blood—” Keith finished tightening the bolt and pointed the wrench at Lotor “—I’m gonna leave the room.”

Clearly biting back a scowl, Lotor looked up from his book. “Would you rather I detail the many unproven theories surrounding the physical changes a vam- _changeling_ endures?”

“How ‘bout you start with what the changes are,” Keith grumbled, fiddling with a pipe that had popped out of place. Except Lotor didn’t say anything, so Keith looked up at him, eyebrows raised.

Lotor was watching him, lips pursed and book shut.

“What?”

“You do realize,” Lotor said slowly, “that I would simply be going over changes you’ve already manifested, correct?”

Snorting, Keith returned to messing with the pipe. Of course he knew that; he’d died with sun-tanned peach fuzz and woken to skin the shade of a middle-aged bruise. And his face… those angled, violet lines darting across his cheekbones were unmistakable in their proclamation of unnatural life. Those had haunted him in the reflected visions of water and polished steel; mirrors failed him, now.

Keith hated the Change. For so long the only constant in his life had been himself, but death had taken that from him as well. And he hated it, hated everything that it had done to him and all the things it had taken from him. Keith’s life hadn’t been much, but it had still been _his_ , damn it.

Swallowing the painful nostalgia, Keith asked, “What about you? What’d you look like?”

Lotor hesitated, and Keith looked up to see the conflict on his face. A moment passed in taut silence. “I have always been this way,” Lotor said, voice soft enough to ride the dust in the air. “My mother underwent the Change while pregnant with me; I am a vampire with uncertain immortality.” Bitterly, Lotor smiled. “But I’ve lasted this long, so I suppose I have time left yet.”

“More than enough to stop calling yourself a vampire,” Keith agreed, forcing a smile to chase away the unpleasant electricity in the air.

Eyes flashing like the broken Christmas lights hidden in Keith’s dresser, Lotor laughed. “You’re right, of course.” His smile took on a more genuine tilt, and Lotor said, “Now I can’t help but wonder what you looked like before the Change.”

Keith cringed. “Better than this,” he said, words leaving his lips and scorching him with their aggrieved honesty. “Like- like a person. Like I was whole and alive and,” he laughed, “ _human._ ”

Leaning forward, Lotor held Keith’s face in his long, elegant hands, claws sheathed for the moment. His yellow eyes flitted over Keith’s face — and Keith flinched. He tried not to think of his appearance when he could avoid it (had never been the type to be concerned with his appearance anyway) but having someone — having _Lotor_ look at him like this… it was almost more than he could take. Especially when Lotor was so beautiful — flawless, sharp, _handsome_ — that Keith could never hope to compare.

Then Lotor smiled his sharp, cutting smile. Except it was softened, somehow, by the words he spoke: “You’re perfect, Keith.”

And there was nothing to say to a thing like that, not when it had caught him off guard, but Keith couldn’t just leave it hanging on the wind. Compliments and congratulations left unacknowledged would haunt him for centuries. So Keith, breathless, stunned, amazed, said: “Thanks.”

Somehow, that was the right thing to say. Lotor rubbed his thumbs over Keith’s cheeks, tracing the markings on his cheekbones and gentle against the tender spots beneath Keith’s right eye.

It was at that moment Keith realized he was fucked.

 _Don’t get attached,_ he’d thought upon meeting Lotor. He’d failed miserably at that; unattached people didn’t lean into another’s embrace and press a kiss to their lips. Or maybe they did — Keith wouldn’t know. He wasn’t one of them.

Gasping, Keith pulled back. What had he done? This had to be a mistake; he’d seen the way Lotor watched him, but surely this was too much too soon. Stomach igniting in flame, Keith was violently aware of Lotor’s hands cupping his face — and he was equally aware of Lotor’s lips finding his again, and the warmth of Lotor’s breath on his face and the brightness in his lidded eyes.

This was free-fall, Keith realized. Kissing Lotor was driving his cycle over the edge of a cliff with his lift-suspension out of line; it was every starry night Keith had spent underneath the branches of the mesquite tree wondering what it would be like to cross the universe and find his place among the stars; the kiss was everything.

And it was nothing.

Lotor pulled away, sharp smile dulled until it hardly qualified as a smile anymore, and the fire in Keith’s stomach sputtered and died, leaving him cold. What was Lotor thinking? More important, what was he _feeling?_ Keith wanted to ask, to beg for clarity, but Lotor had never been so forthcoming with his emotions.

So Keith fell. Keith fell hard — or he would have, anyway, had he landed. But he was stuck in free-fall, and Lotor’s lips were to blame.

“I’m sorry,” Keith said.

Bright, yellow eyes studied Keith’s face, taking in the maelstrom of emotions moving there. Ducking his head, Keith stepped back. He needed to forget this had ever happened and shove his feelings down deep where he’d never need to deal with them or burden anyone else with them again. He needed a plan for avoiding Lotor, for hiding, for—

—Lotor’s hand found Keith’s, and Keith stared at it, flushed and terrified.

“There’s no rush, you know.” Lotor cleared his throat and dropped Keith’s hand. “We have all of eternity waiting for us after all,” he added carefully, as if the wrong words would send Keith running. Perhaps they would.

“Ye- yeah,” Keith said, words stumbling over his tongue. “All the time in the world.”

Lotor smiled his crisp smile, and Keith relaxed. When had that smile become so familiar? “There’s no need to figure out your emotions any time soon. Or ever, really. However, whatever you find, and what you decide to do with what’s there, is your choice. Whatever it may be, I’ll respect your decision when you make it. Take your time,” he repeated, sitting stiffly on the couch and setting the book on his thigh. “After all, we have plenty left.”

 _We,_ he said, and Keith smiled. Simple words did nothing to dispel his anxiety, for only time could do such a thing, but Keith knew that Lotor meant what he’d said. Eternity’s infinite road to oblivion was laid out before them, and Keith would never again face the limits of mortality.

Smiling, Keith fiddled with the motor, and Lotor returned to his book. Keith wasn’t sure what he felt, or what he wanted to do about it. Death was a permanent infliction, but if Keith played his cards right, he wouldn’t need to spend eternity alone.

There were a few benefits to being dead, Keith knew, and he would be around to appreciate each and every one of them, new and strange as they were.

**Author's Note:**

> yooo i've been busting my ass over this fic bc the story just didn't wanna _click_ but it came together real nice tonight and tbh? i'm happy with the final product -- still, i always appreciate feedback in the comments or on [the tumbs](https://alcego.tumblr.com/) so i can continue to improve my craft!! =D


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